End of the road

Ah, a common feature of the wet season forest is the bridge or raised track which ends in an expanse of impassable mud. Today it's the bridge over Red Rise Brook. Honestly, it's such a frequent occurrence that you'd think it was intentional; extend it a few meters more and it would have reached the higher firmer ground. Still, it makes for hilarity as you try reach dry ground via a network of semi submerged sticks and branches.

Yellow Brain fungus

Yellow Brain fungus (Tremella mesenterica) bursting out from one of the charred gorse bush remains which litter the slope of Rock Hills.  They're a very common fungus on dead wood throughout the forest, with their bright colour making them easy to spot in the dulling autumn heathland.

Pigs

We knew the pigs were out to pannage around the forest (pannage is the tradition of releasing pigs into the forest to hoover up the acorns, dangerous in high quantities to the forest's ponies), although this was our first spotting of them this season. It's always lovely to see them out, they add something to the forest...maybe it's a dim echo of the past when wild pigs would have been a common sight in the landscape. Geoff was interested in them and wanted a closer look, but the young pigs were more interested in him and wanted an even closer look...Geoff ran away.  I don't know if this was a family group, the sow did look different to the younger pigs accompanying her, that said, I know little about the Suidae family. Whatever, they were a healthy and inquisitive bunch, enjoying the autumnal sun and their nutty feast (acorns have been particularly bountiful this year).

Red Rise risen

Today Red Rise Brook has risen making places to cross limited, the usually gentle and docile stream is running well beyond it's banks, with crossings limited to the forestry bridges and a couple of fortuitously placed trees. Of course, it can extend much further, to the point where as a consequence of flooding even the bridges are redundant, although today's still a timely reminder of the shape of the wet season forest, and it's associated navigational considerations. 

Forest flotsam

Walking through nature is akin to walking through an open air organic art gallery and sculpture park packed with endless ever changing and evolving installations. Just like any gallery, you get the best out of your visit when you really take time to look, take in all the detail. Everywhere you look you'll find groovy patterns, interesting shapes and textures, from the large sculptural pieces of the stands through the forests infinite minutia, and everything in between, it's all there to be seen. This piece was created by recent flood waters breaching the banks of Red Rise Brook and scouring the floor of its wooded environs, dumping blended graded smears of woodland flotsam as it receded. Honestly, it's as if the woodland floor has been swept clean. It serves to highlight the extent to which these small forest streams flood and with what force, you'd be surprised. 

The autumn forest

The autumn forest. Red Rise Wood and Shade with Burley Old beyond, as seen from Rock Hills on the edge of Spy Holms. A view you never tire of, and lovely route to take into the forest.

Hard rain

The sound of acorns falling earthward followed us on our walk through Burley Old and along the wooded corridor of Red Rise Brook this morning...it was near continuous. It's been a good year for the acorn, with oaks boughs hanging low, soon you'll be treading them underfoot as they begin to cover the forest floor. The pigs will be happy though, in a few weeks it'll be pannage. Pannage in the New Forest dates back to AD1079, when during September around 600 pigs (much greater numbers were released in previous centuries) are released into the forest stands for a minimum of two months to eat their fill of Oaknuts (as well as other nuts). A feast for the pigs and a blessing for the New Forest ponies; acorns are poisonous to ponies. I look forward to seeing the pigs roaming the woodland, they're animals with character. You need to watch out, mind, not all of them are friendly, although that said, most are, and very inquisitive too. 

Crabby

The boughs of the forests Crab Apple trees (Malus sylvestris) are hanging low with nice sized fruits throughout Red Rise Shade. Hardy buggers the forest crab apples, you'll still see fruits hanging on right through the winter months. Fingers crossed, I'm hoping to makes some vodka based crab apple liqueur, come fall. I've not made it before, though it's pretty much the same as making sloe gin/vodka by all accounts, which is straight forward enough.

Alder

Sat by Red Rise Brook this morning I noticed a young Alder (Alnus glutinosa) sapling clinging to the bank. Alder is fairly common amongst the forests carr woodland communities, in the bogs and stream environs, more so in some places than others, it has to be said. It's a very useful wood, it was commonly coppiced and is often recognized by its stool. Along Avon Water below Wootton Bridge years of Alder coppicing have created huge stools with multiple stems. It's a water tolerant hardwood, used in furniture making and Fender guitars, you get dyes from the bark, it has medicinal properties too and it's said that you can eat its catkins, though I'm not that hungry. In recent history New Forest Alder charcoal was produced and used in huge quantities in gas mask production during World War Two. I always think it's a tree which I overlook in the woods, others popping to mind more readily, that maybe as I tend to avoid the wetter parts of the forest as a rule (as if such a thing is possible) and don't meet up with them as much as I should.

Bloomin' nice

The blossom's out all over, though none more so than along the banks of Red Rise Brook. It's a riot of bright white flower blossom along there at the moment, swathes of blackthorn are putting on a proper show. It's a really good year for blossom in the forest too. Amongst the sea of white a beautiful apple tree coming into blossom, there's something special about the the scent of apple blossom, something heady and magical; I can't pass apple blossom without taking a moment or two to breath it in. It smelt lovely too. Just one of springs little pleasures.

Stuck in the middle, confused.

Sunshine to the left of me, hail stones on the right, here I am stuck in the middle confused. Strange day indeed, though one of the joys of periods of seasonal transition are strange days, when weather wise anything can happen. I sat breathing in the forest under a favourite Oak on the edge of Red Rise Shade, in front of me an expanse of heathland stretching up to Rock Hills and Spy Holms, glorious sunshine warming my face, I'm lost in the sounds of the forest. When suddenly hail begins to fall, though the sun still shone warmly, and for a while both states continued in unison. It was quite an strange sensation, two diametrically opposed weather types simultaneously doing their things, magical.  A take on, 'a foxes riddle and a monkey's dance', something my mum used to say, when it rained whilst the sun shone. Seeing how things were going, we moved off back down towards the brook and the less exposed stands of Burley Old. As we hurried, the sky slowly darkened and the hail intensified until it dominated, and the sun, sensing the futility of struggling, retreated. Intense would describe the rate of fall, ans although the downpour was relatively short lived, by the time the hail had stopped the ground was carpeted in small icy balls. It's never dull walking in the forest. Elements of spring, hail and welcome.

Red Rise Brook

Red Rise Brook

Reflection

The forest's a perfect place to reflect.

Nationalist graffiti

I wonder if we'll ever cure humanities distasteful nationalist and xenophobic tendencies? If you remember 1970's Britain (and the 1980's to a lesser degree) then you'll recognize the conjoined letters carved into the tree. NF, the National Front, racist boot boy bullies, white nationalists trumpeting Britain whilst doing Nazi salutes, to put them simply...the enemy. Ignorant racists, who also enjoyed a whole suit of other intolerances, and most of whom had never met a person of differing culture or ethnicity. Periodically they returned, in the 90's as the BNP, the British National Party and more recently as the EDL the English Defence League, nearly 50 years on, although the acronyms change, the same tired right wing nationalist rhetoric and slogans endure. Currently they're the most vocal and powerful I've known them, Brexit unleashed them, Brexit is based on xenophobia, they say 'not everybody who voted Brexit is a racist, though every racist voted Brexit'. And the same shit is happening all over. Thriving on fear and disenfranchisement, inexhaustible products of our political systems, they'll always find an angry desperate ear that'll listen. Sad times. I was afforded a schadenfreude moment with the most recent immigration figures though, predominantly white Christian Europeans down, predominantly coloured non Christian rest of the world types up, oh the irony, poetic really. And the graffiti is from 1970's, I don't think they made Rays after the 70's.  

Jack in the woods

Jack's been out spreading icy mischief about the forest, any exposed water is  adorned in a crunchy glaze, every frond and leaf languishing in the frosty shade is dusted like a chilly doughnut and still his shivery breath fills the hollows, piercing any exposed skin. The forest's cold, I know, it should be, it's winter, and the addition of a northerly wind ensures you really feel it. Even a increasingly determined sun lends little relief, though any momentary relief is welcomed and embraced, no matter how weak or fleeting. Lovely walking mind.

Oxbows

It's not until the wet season that you can make out the early 19th century meandering course of Red Rise Brook in one of its un-restored sections. Its truncated oxbows are always there, though they're just easily overlooked, the years have seen them silt up and become colonized by heathland flora, although when water filled you can easily follow the streams pre Victorian course, which meandered similarly to Mill Lawn Brook up stream. I don't know if they intend to restore this section of stream at any point. Though, it's just dawned on that the bog woodland restoration program may cease after brexit, as it's an EU initiative, and EU funded too, so there maybe no more restoration projects in the forest. Another story the landscape will tell.

Ordered by natural process

Ordered by natural process. As the waters recede and the forest streams retreat back within their banks, they leave behind them the well ordered vestiges of autumns glories. It's quite a wonder to see.

Red Rise

The rain fell mainly on the plain. Actually it didn't, it fell all over the forest and then bled from the landscape through a filigree of rivulets, whereupon it engorged the forest streams causing them to burst their band and flood the surrounding environs. It gets much better than this, this is just the beginning, when properly inundated the water extends quiet some distance. This was the whole point of restoring the forests streams to their pre-Victorian courses, to slow the waters transit, holding more water in the forest and creating bog woodland environments. Well, it's working. I've walked this roam for decades and rarely in the past did Red Rise Brook breach it's banks, it had to be extraordinarily wet for weeks and even then it was never as expansive as it regularly is today.